Vintners are reporting widespread damage in Bordeaux, Burgundy and Champagne, with some losing their entire 2017 crop.

California's vineyards are coming back from the brink of disaster thanks to the winter rains

Patrick Comiskey - 05 Apr 2017

California’s vineyards — Central Coast vineyards in particular — are coming back from the brink of disaster. Record low rainfall levels, coupled with record average temperatures in an age of global warming, had left viticulture from Monterey to Ventura in a low-grade peril. The five-year drought had been so inexorable in its effects, so disruptive to seasonal cycles, that growers were having a hard time imagining what a return to normal would look like.

New book: Understanding Wine Chemistry

John Wiley & Sons - 15 Sep 2016

A new book, Understanding Wine Chemistry, is the result of an international collaboration of faculty from three of the best-known wine programs in the English-speaking world. Dr David Jeffery (the University of Adelaide) and fellow authors, Professor Andrew Waterhouse (University of California Davis) and Associate Professor Gavin Sacks (Cornell University), announced their book at an August 21 release event sponsored by the publisher, John Wiley & Sons, at the 252nd American Chemical Society Meeting in Philadelphia.

Happy 80th anniversary to 75 French appellations

'Catastrophic' hail in Chablis, Cognac and Beaujolais

Yohan Castaing - 01 Jun 2016

Fierce hailstorms have damaged vineyards in parts of Chablis in Burgundy, plus Beaujolais and Cognac, leading the country's farming federation to declare a 'state of catastrophe' in the worst-hit areas.

Heatwave shrivelling French wine production

Scientists make a chance discovery in frost grape vines

by Steve Tarter in Journal Star - 03 Feb 2016

A chance discovery of gum oozing out of a vine found all around central Illinois by USDA Ag Lab scientists has led to to what may be a new source for a thickening agent that is used in all manner of foods and cosmetics.

Potassium polyaspartate - a new tool for tartrate stabilisation

Gianni Triulzi - 08 Dec 2015

Potassium POLYASPARTATE is a new additive overcoming all the technical limits of present tartrate stabilisation alternatives and joining to these positive characteristics an excellent level of economic and environmental sustainability. It is a stable polymer of L-aspartic acid, able to totally inhibit the formation of tartrate crystals even in highly unstable wines, without color loses and without effect on wine filterability.

H2S and mercaptans: New discoveries

Oenoppia press release on infowine.com - 26 Nov 2015

Researchers have demonstrated for the first time that H2S and mercaptans in wine are not only present in volatile (odorous) form. They also exist in odourless complexes (with other other molecules) and are hence undetectable. Wine contains many sulphur compounds that may be released throughout its life span in bottles since these combinations are reversible.

New grapevine virus detected in California

by Ted Rieger in Winebusiness.com - 17 Nov 2015

A grapevine virus formally recognized in 2012 by Italian researchers as grapevine Pinot Gris virus (GPGV) and associated with disease symptoms in Pinot Gris/Grigio in Italy since 2003, was recently detected in California grapevines in Napa Valley.

App to help manage grapevines

http://phys.org/news/2015-10-app-grapevines.html - 26 Oct 2015

A new, free phone app developed by University of Adelaide researchers will help grapegrowers and viticulturists manage their vines by giving a quick measure of vine canopy size and density. The iPad and iPhone app uses the devices' camera and GPS capability to calculate the size and density of the vine canopy and its location in the vineyard. The aim is to help users monitor their vines and manage the required balance between vegetative growth and fruit production.

The development of the app – called VitiCanopy – has been supported by Wine Australia as part of a wider project investigating the relationships between vine balance and wine quality.

The great Brettanomyces taste test

by Robert Joseph - 16 Oct 2015

What would the result be if Brett-spiked wines were given to an international panel of experienced palates? "The largest segment of the 214 attendees chose the most heavily spiked wine, with almost as many picking the ‘threshold’ version."

Why it’s difficult to sell wine in China (part I)

LI Demei - Decanter - 14 Oct 2015

Why it’s difficult to sell wine in China (part I). "However, the actual sales of wine are not in proportion to the amount of exposure it gets. It seems everyone is talking about wine, but in fact wines are not selling as well as you would expect."

New study strengthens case against soil-based minerality

by Darren Smith in the Drinks business - 14 Oct 2015

A new study has provided further evidence that the perception of minerality in wine is not linked to soil. The findings emerged from the second part of a two-year research project, titled ‘Minerality in Wines‘, conducted by Spanish wine analysis company Excell Ibérica and Outlook Wine.

Climate change threatens European wine production

The EU is the world's biggest wine producer, but a recent publication has revealed the extent to which the sector is under threat from climate change. EurActiv France reports.

The harvest is already over for many Beaujolais wine makers. Early harvests have also taken producers in many other French regions by surprise. Some wine makers were concerned by the unusually hot summer, but the resulting high sugar content in this year's grapes, which guarantees a high level of alcohol in the finished product, is seen by many as a good thing. But the authors of the book Threats to wine. The challenges of climate change, Valery Laramée de Tannenberg and Yves Leers, fear the celebrations could be short lived.

Bordeaux winemaker death inquiry to focus on pesticides

Jane Anson - Decanter - 18 Jul 2015

A potentially groundbreaking criminal investigation is set to be launched in France over claims that the death of a Bordeaux winemaker was caused by exposure to pesticides. The first steps towards a criminal prosecution came after Valerie Murat filed legal action over the the death of her father, claiming ‘involuntary homicide’. James-Bernard Murat, a winemaker in Pujols in the Entre deux Mers region of Bordeaux, died of lung cancer in 2012. He believed the disease was caused by his use of a pesticide to protect against vine trunk disease esca for more than 40 years.

Little Fly, Big Problem for Wine

Neville Galvin - 17 Mar 2015

Last year was difficult enough for vintners in many of Europe's leading wine regions, thanks to a gray, wet summer that slowed grape ripening and encouraged mildew. But they also had to grapple with a new pest during the 2014 harvest: a foreign fruit fly. Drosophila suzukii, commonly known as the spotted wing drosophila, was first spotted in Europe in 2008. And last year's weather encouraged a population swell that left grapegrowers wrestling with an unfamiliar pest. They're worried this year could bring more flies—and trouble.